Caminar cantando, tres ejemplos en la obra literaria de Marguerite Duras

Abstract

What happens with a text that associates the bodily-sound phenomenon that singing entails with the bodily act that implies movement in space? How do the effects of both actions combine to achieve an exacerbation of emotion in reading? These are some of the questions that we will reflect on and try to answer by addressing the examples of three characters in the literary work of Marguerite Duras. We will first analyze the beggar in Le Vice-Consul (1966), who wanders through inhospitable landscapes tracing the path of exile and, in doing so, sings a childhood song. We will then see how the teacher of L’Été 80 (1980) sings a popular piece to a five-year-old boy to indirectly tell him that she loves him while they are walking on the beach during a holiday camp. Finally, we will address the character of the viceconsul who appears in the homonymous novel and who whistles while wandering through the embassy gardens in search of Anne Marie Stretter. We think that, by having several points of convergence that allow them to relate, singing and walking come together to characterize in different ways these three characters who walk while singing or sing while walking, enhancing the effects that both actions have on reading.